


Smear of Ash

by Abyssinia



Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-28
Updated: 2009-01-28
Packaged: 2017-10-02 23:46:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abyssinia/pseuds/Abyssinia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The sky blooms red when she and Daniel climb out of the wreckage of the Mountain. Sam runs as far as she can -- past naked aspens, the piles of leaves like miniature corpses covering the ground. She shouts until her voice cracks.  There is no answer. Not even crickets.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Smear of Ash

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Porn Battle VII  
> Thanks to Holdouttrout for the beta

The sky blooms red when she and Daniel climb out of the wreckage of the Mountain. Sam runs as far as she can -- past naked aspens, the piles of leaves like miniature corpses covering the ground. She shouts until her voice cracks. There is no answer. Not even crickets.

Daniel finds her at the edge of the highway into the Springs, where cars and trucks are crashed all over the road, drivers slumped over the wheel or scattered on the ground like broken, used-up toys. She has her arms wrapped tight around herself against the cold, but that isn't why she's shaking, and when he presses himself against her back, she doesn't feel warmer.

"C'mon," he says in her ear, turning her away from the destruction. She follows him like a good tin soldier.

They build a hut under a sky still tinged pink and stock it with food, water, supplies. As though there is something to wait out. As though anyone is coming. Sam can't get any signals, even with NORAD letting her scan most of the globe. Later Daniel points out that Area 51 has equipment not available elsewhere on Earth. She doesn't know why she didn't think of it.

Two days later they find McKay wandering outside the ghost town of Area 51, so even with the lack of useful information the trip isn't a total waste. He's shocky and babbling and can't keep his hands off her. For once she doesn't care. He falls asleep in the backseat of the jeep on the way back to hut sweet home. When they get there he wakes up just long enough to devour three Power Bars. He still hasn't asked a single question.

After a week Sam comes back from another failed attempt at getting the 'gate to do anything to find Daniel loading the jeep. "We have to get out of here," he tells her. "There's nothing for us. And if the 'gate isn't going to work --" she shakes her head "-- then we need to go to Minnesota." There's an Al'kesh in Minnesota, cloaked in the woods behind a cabin she didn't visit often enough when she had the chance. Now she doesn't know whether to hope more that the Al'kesh is still there or that they won't find a corpse when they get there.

Somewhere just inside the Iowa border McKay wakes up enough to complain about his allergies, as though there is any pollen left in the air. An hour of dead corn fields later he asks, "So how did you guys survive?"

"Merlin's device," Sam says while Daniel swears and maneuvers around more crashed cars. "I tried to extend it to the whole mountain but..."

"There wasn't time," Daniel finishes. "What about you?"

"Accident." McKay's voice shakes a bit. "Was running a test on the Ancient personal shield."

An hour and too many dead cows (no bacteria left to speed up the decay) later McKay breaks the silence again. "What happened?" Sam isn't sure why she isn't surprised he didn't ask sooner.

"We don't know," Daniel starts.

"Daniel," she interrupts sharply. "A ship we've never seen before came out of hyperspace and didn't respond to hails. Landry sent the Daedalus to investigate and..."

"Zap," Daniel finishes.

"Are you seriously telling me it was a mysterious alien death ray?" McKay practically squeaks. "That's ridiculous."

Sam nods her head. She isn't laughing. "I can't find any residual radiation, so whatever it was, I think it's a onetime thing."

McKay's fingers tap the glass a minute. "Some electronic signal to disrupt communication between neurons?" he suggests.

Sam shakes her head. "Plants."

"Ultra-sonic pulses at the right frequency to shatter cell membranes?"

"No structural damage. Bodies are whole." They pass a four-car pile up. "Well, some of them."

"Microwave heating?"

"Do you smell charred flesh?"

"Sucked up all the oxygen?"

"Plants. And you're breathing now, aren't you? Jesus, McKay, you keep telling me you're so smart," she snaps.

"I don't hear you giving any answers Miss. Alien Death Ray."

Before she can respond Daniel swings the steering wheel to the right, pulling onto a gravel road before slamming on the parking brake and getting out of the car. Sam opens her door and calls, "Daniel?"

"We're stopping here for the night," he shouts and she watches his back until he disappears in the gloom.

They're roasting hot dogs on sticks and munching on carrots from the bag at Daniel's feet. Sam can't tear her eyes away from the crack and pop of the flames, sparks flying up to disappear into the night. "I think, somehow, they disrupted mitochondria," she says.

McKay tilts his head to the side and wrinkles his nose at his hot dog. "Yeah, that could work."

Sam's watch says it's September 28th. And a Monday. Late enough that the nights are cold when they hit Minnesota and after entering houses to the stench of dead bodies, even McKay says nothing when Daniel spreads a blanket on the ground. They have two. They share.

She wakes from a restless sleep (her watch says 2 am) to see Daniel, nose inches from her own, staring into nothing. Only McKay's soft snores break the silence that presses down on them. "Hey," she whispers, shifting forward, careful to not disturb McKay. Daniel shivers when her lips brush his, holds still a second before kissing her back. "We'll be okay," she whispers against his mouth. "We'll find a new home, survive."

"I'm tired of being the one who survives," he whispers back before returning her kiss, gentle and tentative.

"I could say the same thing about you," she points out, lifting her hand to the perfect skin where a staff blast once hit. The first time he really died on her. She kisses him harder then, opening her mouth, nipping at his lower lip, until he groans and they both freeze at the aborted snore behind her, feign sleep as Rodney looks around.

The Al'kesh is where it should be and the area thankfully corpse-free, but the engine won't start. After she throws a wrench at him on the third day, Daniel takes to disappearing all day, leaving her to put up with McKay and uncooperative alien equipment, and coming back with food just as they're starting to snap at each other.

When it finally starts up, engine sounding less like a purr, more like a dying rooster, she steps back from the control crystals with a shout of victory and runs outside to where McKay is standing next to the dismantled access panel, smear of grease on his cheek and stupid grin on his mouth. "We might make it yet," she tells him and he turns around, grease and stupid grin and all, and hugs her. She doesn't have time to be surprised before he bends his head and kisses her and, what they heck, they're getting away from this graveyard. She returns his kiss enthusiastically, only stopping when the rustle of leaves tells her Daniel is on his way back.

They stumble and limp at way below top speed and Sam guesses a minimum of two weeks of boring, empty blackness to the closest planet with a stargate. "Any twos?" Rodney asks. "And how can you not appreciate Lara Croft?" He makes it sound like a personal crime

"Go fish," Daniel tells him. "Because the archaeology was terrible."

"But she's hot," Rodney declares, pulling a card from the pile and scowling at it.

"Right, Rodney, because that's all that matters," Daniel retorts and Sam doesn't have to look to seem him rolling his eyes. "Got any tens?"

Sam hands him a card. "C'mon, Daniel, you watched that mummy movie."

"Only because Jack made me."

"You couldn't stop talking about it for _weeks_!"

"Because you guys kept bringing it up. Teal'c...Teal'c..." Daniel's voice fades away and he looks up to meet Sam's eyes across the cards. Name the dead enough times and they haunt you.

Sam stands up, letting the artificial gravity pull the cards in her hand to wherever they might land. Outside the window the darkness pulses at her, pushing in, suffocating, and she turns her back and heads to the cargo area. Daniel chokes out her name as she walks by. Rodney's silence screams at her.

She's lying on her back in the dim light, feeling the vibrations from the Al'kesh's shody engines run through her, when footsteps warn her of company. She keeps her eyes closed as the warm body spoons up next to her but responds to the kiss, bringing up a hand to tangle in hair that is undoubtedly Daniel's. Before she can think she pulls him on top of her, arching her hips to rub where he's hardening against her thigh. He groans then and she opens her mouth, letting him explore with lips and tongue and teeth, kissing her more fiercely as he snakes a hand under her shirt, which soon lands on the floor by her head. He kisses his way down her torso -- sucking at her neck, giving individual attention to each breast, almost-tickling her ribs -- and finally slowly kisses a path south from her belly-button. By the time he settles between her legs and begins to tease her through two layers of cloth, she's ready to just rip everything off already, fling him onto his back, and take what she needs.

His head jerks at the cough from the doorway. Rodney's eyes lock on hers and he shifts like he's going to turn to leave but she holds out her hand and calls, "Rodney, it's okay," because he has the same haunted look they have and he lost everyone too. He still hesitates, until Daniel sits back on his heels and holds a hand out.

Daniel intercepts Rodney as he's kneeling down, pulls in his head for an actual kiss, and Sam uses the distraction to slide out from beneath Daniel's legs and move behind him. She wraps her arms around his torso, then slides lower, rubbing the heel of her hand over his erection before thumbing open the buttons on his fly. He arches into her palm, moaning into Rodney's mouth, when she reaches inside and uses her fingertips to stroke circles over the head of his cock. She manages to wrap her hand around Daniel, give three solid pulls, before Rodney pushes back and looks at her, pupils blown. Sam can barely see over Daniel's shoulder to where his hand is similarly working at Rodney's crotch.

They get her on her back and if she keeps her eyes closed she can pretend she doesn't know whose mouth is on her breasts (Rodney uses more teeth) and who is sucking on her clit (Daniel's tongue is more dextrous) and she comes with Daniel's head between her legs, Rodney's mouth at the base of her neck, and Daniel thrusting into her fist. After a minute she rolls over, still tingling, to find Daniel naked on his back with Rodney on top of him, pants fallen midway down his thighs. She leans over to tug them off, then runs a hand slowly back up his leg, watches the gooseflesh rise as she goes against the grain of his hairs. He shivers and whines, pushing his hips up and back, when she reaches the sensitive skin on the inside of his thigh.

She rolls Rodney off Daniel, onto his side, and reaches down to cup his balls, give a few tugs on his shaft, before bending down and sucking gently on just the head. When he tries to push forward she moves her mouth with him, teasing. Beneath her Daniel shifts away, bending her leg forward and spooning up behind her and when she feels the tip of his cock start to breach her she sucks Rodney in, feeling his fingers clutch at her hair.

She tries to keep the pace slow, ignoring Rodney's hands and hoarse breathing, but when Daniel reaches around to stroke her clit and increases his tempo, she can't resist the moan that sends vibrations down Rodney's shaft. When Rodney's muscles tense she pulls back, leaning her head against Daniel's shoulder and watches Rodney look down, see where they're joined, and whisper, "oh, god," before pumping into her hand, splashing warm and yeasty onto the floor.

Daniel redoubles his efforts and she can feel another orgasm building as she pushes back into his motion. When Rodney leans down to kiss her, roll her nipple between his fingers, she shudders and clenches and comes apart between them, nearly pushing Daniel out, who grunts and pushes back in, coming on the tail end of her orgasm. Rodney rolls onto his back while Daniel stills, letting his head fall onto her shoulder so his breath puffs warm and moist onto her neck. When he slips out of her Rodney has an arm over his eyes and she rolls around to look at Daniel. His face looks older without glasses.

Daniel reaches a finger to rub at moisture on her cheek and brings it to her mouth where she licks at the salty offering. "We'll get there, Sam," he says. "Find somewhere to start over." She wonders if they can go far enough the ghosts won't find them, feels her lip tremble beneath his finger. "Ssh," he whispers, leaning forward to kiss her around his finger. "One day at a time."


End file.
